Dr. Jeff Pettis, Honey Bee Well being Knowledgeable, Joins Terra Vera as a Technical Consultant
Agtech innovation corporate expands the succeed in
of its bee coverage and well being optimization answers
Albuquerque, NM (Would possibly 15, 2024) — Agriculture generation innovator Terra Vera is proud to announce that Dr. Jeff Pettis, a famend entomologist who makes a speciality of apiculture and honey bee well being, has joined the corporate as an guide and trade marketing consultant.
The appointment of Dr. Pettis coincides with Terra Vera’s increasing analysis and tasks to keep bee colonies, that are regularly threatened via the insecticides used all through industrial agriculture. The corporate just lately revealed two box research at the efficacy of its amino acid-based answers in selling bee well being and lowering colony cave in.
In his function as a specialist for Terra Vera, Dr. Pettis will help with the improvement and growth of the corporate’s suite of goods to optimize bee well being and give protection to towards not unusual threats to bees and different pollinators, such as parasites, pesticide poisoning, deficient diet, and illness.
Honey bee colonies have skilled critical declines in recent times, with just about part of controlled colonies misplaced in the USA in 2023, the second-highest dying price on document. On the other hand, Terra Vera is creating an amino acid-based resolution that has proven certain features towards the Varroa destructor mite, the number 1 danger to honey bees international. Trying out up to now has demonstrated the answer’s efficacy and has now not led to mortality or side effects at the well being of the bees. Terra Vera is looking for EPA approval to be used.
“I’ve devoted my whole occupation to finding out honey bees and figuring out viable answers to handle the quite a lot of threats to their well being and survival,” mentioned Dr. Pettis. “Till Terra Vera, I had but to come back throughout a transformative generation that may dramatically toughen colony well being and survival charges each safely and sustainably – one thing that isn’t best crucially essential to beekeepers, but in addition useful to the wellbeing of our ecosystems and world meals safety. I’m inspired with the natural nature of the Terra Vera product, as we want extra natural choices to make use of in beekeeping.”
As a analysis scientist and marketing consultant at Pettis and Buddies LLC, Dr. Pettis has targeted his house of experience on making improvements to colony well being via proscribing the have an effect on of pests, illnesses, and insecticides on honey bees. Dr. Pettis has labored with each the EPA and FDA to convey new merchandise throughout the registration procedure for bees and beekeepers.
Previous to changing into an unbiased marketing consultant, Dr. Pettis served because the analysis chief of the USDA-ARS Bee Analysis Laboratory in Beltsville, MD. His analysis spaces come with IPM ways to scale back the affects of parasitic mites and illness, results of insecticides, pathogens, and temperature on queen well being and longevity, host-parasite relationships, and bee conduct.
Dr. Pettis has consulted with a number of global committees or organizations, together with the International Group for Animal Well being (WOAH). With greater than 40 years of analysis enjoy in additional than 15 international locations, he’s steadily tapped via the media for his evaluations at the international decline of pollinator populations and honey bee well being. Dr. Pettis won his doctoral stage in entomology from Texas A&M College and holds undergraduate and MS levels from the College of Georgia.
Terra Vera’s foray into bee coverage with Dr. Pettis’ steerage may just now not come at a extra vital time, with the inhabitants of honey bee colonies proceeding to spiral downward, after plummeting via greater than 30% from 1989 – 2008. Inside the remaining yr, consistent with the USDA, honey bee colonies for operations with 5 or extra colonies in the USA on January 1, 2023, totaled a trifling 2.68 million colonies, down 7% from January 1, 2022.
“It’s an honor to have any person as extremely esteemed and an expert in bee well being and preservation as Dr. Jeff Pettis at the Terra Vera crew,” mentioned Carlos Perea, CEO and Co-Founding father of Terra Vera. “Our corporate was once based at the undertaking to supply scalable agricultural answers to reduce loss whilst optimizing yield in techniques which might be cost-effective, eco-friendly, and protected for bees and different very important pollinators had to maintain world meals provides and the at-risk ecosystems we depend on.”
For more info about Terra Vera, its generation and products and services, please discuss with terravera.com.
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About Terra Vera
Terra Vera is a generation corporate devoted to creating agriculture extra environmentally and economically sustainable. The corporate makes a speciality of crop control answers that change typical chemical insecticides and artificial fertilizers, that are connected to environmental injury and the decline of bees and different pollinators essential to world meals provides. Terra Vera’s biomimicry generation supplies growers and beekeepers with all-natural answers which might be cost-effective, scalable, and generated on call for. For more info about Terra Vera, discuss with terravera.com.
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